Tag: Lester Brown
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How Much Will it Cost to Save Our Economy’s Foundation?
Many will ask, "Can the world afford these investments?" But the only appropriate question is, "Can the world afford the consequences of not making these investments?"
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Harnessing the Sun's Energy for Water and Space Heating
The pace of solar energy development is accelerating as the installation of rooftop solar water heaters takes off.
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The New Scramble for Africa Threatens Water Resources
Photo credit: Dale Gillard/Creative Commons A new scramble for Africa is under way. As global food prices rise and exporters reduce shipments of commodities, countries that rely on imported grain are panicking. Affluent countries like Saudi Arabia,
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Water Shortages Threaten Food Future in the Middle East
Long after the political uprisings in the Middle East have subsided, many underlying challenges that are not now in the news will remain. Prominent among these are rapid population growth, spreading water
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Reorienting the Economy is a Challenge That can be Overcome
We need an economy for the twenty-first century, one that is in sync with the earth and its natural support systems, not one that is destroying them. The fossil fuel-based, automobile-centered, throwaway
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Smart Planning for the Global Family
When it comes to population growth, the United Nations has three primary projections. The medium projection, the one most commonly used, has world population reaching 9.2 billion by 2050. The high one reaches 10.5
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Is Now the Time to Rethink Japan's Energy Future?
Nearly four weeks after a 9.0-magnitude earthquake and tsunami devastated northeastern Japan, emergency personnel are still
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Can the United States Feed China?
In 1994, I wrote an article in World Watch magazine entitled "Who Will Feed China?" that was later expanded into a book of the same title. When the article was published in late August, the press conference
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Essential Data From a World on the Edge
The hundreds of data sets that accompany World on the Edge: How to Prevent Environmental and Economic Collapse, illustrate the world's current predicament and give a
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Is the World One Poor Harvest Away From Chaos?
In early January, the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) reported that its Food Price Index had reached an all-time high in December, exceeding the previous record set during the 2007-08
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Future at Risk on a Hotter Planet
We are entering a new era, one of rapid and often unpredictable climate change. In fact, the new climate norm is change. The 25 warmest years on record have come since 1980. And the 10 warmest years since
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How to Improve Food Security by Reducing Grain Demand
After several decades of Lrapid rise in world grain yields, it is now becoming more difficult to raise land productivity fast enough to keep up with the demands of a growing, increasingly affluent, population.
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The Global Battle to Conserve and Rebuild Soil
The literature on soil erosion contains countless references to the "loss of protective vegetation." Over the last half-century, clearcutting, overgrazing, and overplowing have removed so much of that protective cover
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Civilization's Steadily Eroding Foundation
The thin layer of topsoil that covers the planet's land surface is the foundation of civilization. This soil, typically 6 inches or so deep, was formed over long stretches of geological time as new soil formation exceeded
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The Growing Potential and Rooted Limitations of Biofuels
As oil and natural gas reserves are being depleted, the world's attention is increasingly turning to plant-based energy sources. These include food crops, forest industry byproducts, sugar industry byproducts,
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Tapping the Energy Below the Earth's Surface
The heat in the upper six miles of the earth's crust contains 50,000 times as much energy as found in all the world's oil and gas reserves combined. Despite this abundance, only 10,700 megawatts of geothermal electricity
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Making the Global Shift to Renewable Energy
As fossil fuel prices rise, as oil insecurity deepens, and as concerns about climate change cast a shadow over the future of coal, a new energy economy is emerging. The old energy economy, fueled by oil, coal, and
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Rising Temperatures, Rising Food Prices
Around midnight on Wednesday, August 11th, a group of commodity analysts will gather at a meeting site in the massive South Building of the U.S. Department of Agriculture in Washington, DC. Once they are assembled, the door will
